Many professionals, such as physicians, attorneys, sales representatives and others often find it difficult to communicate with clients, customers, colleagues and assistants. These professionals typically employ human assistants to relay important information, maintain their schedules and filter out all unnecessary interruptions. A virtual assistant is a computer application that allows the professional to access personal, company, and public information, including contacts, schedules, and databases from any interactive device, such as a telephone, laptop computer or Personal Digital Assistant (PDA).
One important function provided by a virtual assistant, which is also used ubiquitously by busy professionals who do not have a virtual assistant, is voice mail. Navigating large databases of non-messaging information, such as a contacts database is also quite cumbersome and difficult with conventional voicemail systems and virtual assistants, particularly, when the database is large and the user is attempting to access the database with a voice user interface.
While the deskbound worker has become even more empowered, the typical mobile worker has a cellular telephone (cell phone) and a laptop computer. Easily getting access to corporate data and managing communication with others, especially while in transit, can be extremely challenging. One solution to the needs of a mobile worker was realized in the form of a proxy, or Personal Virtual Assistant (PVA), which was available to the user and could help manage and coordinate communications and data access.
To a large degree, conventional PVAs allowed a worker, using only their voice and a cell phone, to have the capabilities of email (e.g., Microsoft Outlook) and a multi-function phone (plus some) as they would have had had they been sitting at their desk. These capabilities included email features such as read/annotate/forward/email messages, including attachments and finding messages based on sender, status (read, unread), type (email, voice mail, meeting request), priority etc. PVAs also allowed a user to listen to/forward/return voice mail messages and to accept meeting requests, list meetings, book meetings and the like. PVAs also allowed a user to manage tasks and to call personal and corporate contacts.
Conventional PVAs also allowed a remote worker to utilize phone features. These features include placing outbound calls—initiate calls in response to a voicemail (e.g. ‘return this call’), using a personal or corporate contact or just by saying and keying in a number. A user was also permitted to receive calls with call screening—if the user was in a PVA Session then the user would be alerted of the inbound call and be allowed to talk to that caller (separately or as part of a conference call) or send them to voice mail. The remote user was also able to initiate conference calls and still be able to control each leg of conference. Additional capabilities were also provided.